(taken from a speech Sean Stephens delivered to members of IPAC at "The Digital State at the Leading Edge") answering the question; What is the future role of the high-tech industry in Ontario’s and Canada's economic performance and what role should government play to leverage that success?

The State and the Digital Farmer

Government’s Role in protecting the Digital Economy

Allow me to begin with the obvious: Canadians now require the internet. Where a few prime ministers ago, most of us here had never sent an email or read a PDF – today, it is not just a luxury or a gadget, but a public utility.

I am part of the emerging – if not emerged – group of Canadians who relies on info-tech for survival. If I could have an Ethernet port installed on the back of my neck - I would. It is not that I am a traditional nerd. I am more of a digital addict; and we are everywhere. I had dinner a few days ago with a chemist who was relocating from Mississauga to Newmarket due to the lack of “good enough” connectivity in his apartment. Canada is becoming the nation of information.

I look at the signs; most of the individuals looking for jobs these days have a clear advantage if they are digitally prepared. My grandfather – a self-professed Ludite - recently bought a computer and is now sending and receiving emails. The Internet is everyday life, much like electricity, water, or ceramic.

Although many of us here live today in the digital mindset, I spend my days refining, polishing and delivering mechanisms for moving information. I am a Digital Farmer (er…at the leading edge).

And just like the taming of the “wild west” by the original Canadian settlers, today we digital farmers are taming the “wild web” with the new models of business and interactivity at every level of human life – even government. On a daily basis, my business, Treefrog, is committed to bringing more and more business to the Internet. In some cases, these businesses have no brick and mortar equivalent at all, and in other cases I work to replace or improve business by moving components of brick and mortar to the web. Making them more efficient, more practical, more profitable. (Take a look at NetworkedGovernment.ca for an example of our work)

This movement is unidirectional. Canadians are not regressing to paper systems. We are becoming increasingly reliant on computers and the Internet for all of our information. Today is the future.

We digital farmers already live and die by the availability of content on the Internet. I don’t own a Yellow Pages, I can barely operate a fax machine, and I don’t even know what a stamp costs these days. I don’t have a television. And yet, I receive and reply to hundreds of people on a daily basis, and more importantly - make myself and others money using the Internet.

Furthermore, I use the Internet for social interaction. I use it to shop. I use it to communicate. I use it to research. I use it to play. I use it to live.

To this end, the Internet is no longer a luxury for me, but an economic necessity. A right. Were the Internet to disappear tomorrow, I would be without a business, and without income. My staff would be jobless. Hundreds of Canadian businesses who I maintain and manage on a daily basis would cease to exist or be hamstrung – and therefore would not be supporting the Canadian economy.

Remember, that this movement to the Internet, through innovation and education, is creating more jobs, improving the quality of life Canadians, and boosting the economy daily.

Fortunately, our educational institutions are churning out nerds faster than we can make pocket protectors. Canada is suited to be “a”, if not “the”, world leader in high-tech – specifically info-tech, and become more and more tied to the net and our computers, for many reasons;

1. (Freezing cold, we don’t want to go outside) Work-from-home benefits
2. The need to overcome distance
3. Quality of Education
4. Political Stability
5. Access to Technology
6. A diverse and tolerant population

The future of Canada is rooted in the high-tech industry - When a traditional farmer can control his tractor from a web browser – there is soon to be no need to define the “high-tech” industry. “High-Tech” isn’t just a lofty sector of the economy. It is the economy. We are here. Every business and person in Canada is going to be “high-tech” – if the digital farmer has anything to do with it.

From this position as an entrenched digital farmer, I offer you my plebian perspective on the future of IT and the role of government to leverage and protect the digital farmer and our blossoming high-tech economy.

The future of IT: Protecting the Digital Farmer

First off, government needs to play a role in protecting this high-tech success. Where the traditional role of government is maintaining our physical infrastructure, government must now be engaged in protecting our digital infrastructure.

Regulatory measures, guidelines, and law needs to be in place to protect the digital farmer and the Canadian reliance on the Internet.

Here are a few things you should think about…

1) Neutrality

The most important issue of the day is “net-neutrality”. Today, the internet is a series of “pipes” which connect us all together without discrimination. If I pay to connect to the net, with the quality of service applicable to the cost of connection – then I have the right to communicate at that quality of service with anyone else on the network. A level playing field for everyone connected.

However, for those of you who missed the news recently, the current government through Industry Minister Maxime Bernier (aka the “Bell Minister”) is reluctant to ensure this “neutrality” because it wants to protect the competitive position of businesses who offer Internet access. This turning-a-blind-eye would allow the telecommunication giants to blackmail companies into paying them to have their pages load faster – their information more accessible. Legal discrimination.

This government direction – or lack of - would instantly prevent Canadians from being a successful leader in high-tech, as it would create “class” within the world of the internet. Big budget websites would take over. Small business online would lose any competitive advantage with their innovation. Startups would be muscled out of the marketplace, and web usefulness in general would suffer.

We the innovators, we the tomorrow of Canada, couldn’t survive the stranglehold.

If you told me that I had to pay extra to talk on the phone with one business over another, would that seem consistent with the spirit of democratic competition? The Internet is a seamless, transparent medium, and an artificial raising of prices for existing infrastructure would put us behind the economic pack of the world. A neutral web is one where we all have the same right to innovate.

As an added note - if telcoms have the right to appropriate public property to conduct their business then all Canadians have an equal right to use the service running underneath their sidewalk.

Government has a responsibility to keep the internet neutral to prevent killing off many of the logistical benefits of digital farming in Canada and stay competitive in the world marketplace. With apologies to Mr. King…

“I have a dream, that one day, business in Canada will not be judged by the quality of their Internet connection, but by the strength of their innovation.”

On the contrary from allowing the Internet from being exploited for the profit of the few, government needs to be engaged in promoting and streamlining the digital highways to ensure that communication and information flows freely and quickly.

How can government do this? For example, through…

1. Increased Connectivity – Get Canadians online at higher speeds for less cost as a way of priming more innovation and becoming the leader of the Internet marketplace. Can you say Fibre?
2. Standardization – Create and mandate standards to allow information to be shared and nurtured more seamlessly
3. Protections - Strengthen laws which punish the spammer Ne’re-Do-Wells and their cackling virus-creating brethren (Personally, I’m all for bringing back tar-and-feathering for spammers)
4. Support of Innovation – Support of programs and which inspire collaboration and innovation (e.g. MaRS – excuse the shameless plug)
5. Compelling Education – Help more people get online and use the web more effectively.

2) Business Continuity and Disaster Management

Beyond this, and equally important, government needs to play a much more aggressive role in protecting the digital farmer through business continuity and disaster management. In the wake of global change - from climate disasters to IT outsourcing - government needs to adopt the role of ensuring continuity of communication and services at every level of economic and government function.

We digital farmers need constant availability to the Internet. If Canada wants to keep the info-tech economy rolling, we need to not live in fear of light bulbs flickering.

When the electricity goes out, so does the undercarriage of the Internet. When the Internet goes down, so do millions of hours of productivity. I can tell you from experience, when a business can't get their email for 5 minutes, they panic. When the electricity goes out for two days, we digital farmers are looking everywhere for pitchforks to storm the castle.

Also note, when the electricity goes out, so does government's ability to communicate effectively with citizens. When an ambulance can't be reached due to the levy breaking, faith in government collapses.

So as part of the responsibility of maintaining roads and policing streets, government needs to be aggressively engaged in keeping the digital infrastructure in place and promoting and educating business to survive disaster. Through…

1. Mandating proper security policies and practices
2. Educating on disaster recovery plans
3. Mapping and evaluating the consequences to the economy
4. Disaster preparedness

Protecting the neutrality and backbone of the Internet is protecting the Canadian economy.

Conclusion: The Evolution of Government, the Need to Engage

In conclusion, I think there are many positive implications of info-tech improving the economy of Canada, and solving – or at least improving - many of the environmental and practical issues facing our lives as Canadians. The technological marvels brought forth by Canadian private enterprise has the capacity to ensure stable, long-term economic growth and stability in Canada – and more specifically in Ontario – if we are supported by government.

We need a more coherent vision of the future of information sharing and the protection of digital infrastructure. As my late grandmother said “if you don’t know where you are going, you are likely going to end up somewhere else”. We need mandates, standards and road maps to get there. And we need engagement by the public sector and the political class.